


Tall tales

by InterfaceLeader



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Brotherly Angst, Brotherly Love, End of the World, Gen, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-11-30
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-03 02:11:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1064479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InterfaceLeader/pseuds/InterfaceLeader
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loki had only intended to have a bit of fun; but of course it all goes horribly wrong. The only way to fix things is to go back in time, but that causes some further problems.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Whoops

**Author's Note:**

> I have returned to fanfiction after a long time away. Go easy on me.  
> Rating and archive warnings will probably go up at some point, because I can't write anything without graphic depictions of violence. But this chapter is pretty clean apart from some swearing and some, y'know, death.

Loki had not expected his plan to go so spectacularly wrong.

The gila-monsters, snarling and terrible, had charged around New York, eating people and shredding buildings with razor-sharp tails. Thor barrelled in, exactly as expected, red cape flying behind him like a flag to a bull.

Loki stayed high, watching for the others. When Captain America turned up, resplendent in his stars and stripes, a quick illusion brought forth a fake gila-monster that drew the Captain away from Thor and toward Manhattan.

Time began to press, as Thor managed to bash one gila’s head into bloody debris. The monster fell, tail still whipping back-and-forth. Loki moved on to stage two of his plan, and sent his daggers flying.

He had expected Thor to spin round and smash the daggers out of the air. Thor, after all, knew to watch his back and kept a clear head in battle. He had played the scene out in his head several times; Thor would turn, deflect the daggers, look up and see his brother. Loki would revel in that torn expression, somewhere between hope and despair. Loki hadn’t really thought much beyond that, but he thought he’d probably kill the Captain as a parting gift.

Instead, the daggers embedded themselves into Thor’s back and sought the cracks and chinks of his armour. Thor grunted, turned and struck out with mjollnir. Then he dropped to his knees.

Loki hastily crafted a retrieve spell, that would pull his daggers back - of course they were spellcrafted, designed to burrow deep, seeking out the vital organs - but the Captain’s shield came flying and Loki had to abandon the spell to leap backwards out of the way.

“Thor!” the Captain bellowed, and ran to where Thor had dropped face-first into the concrete. Loki heard him shouting instructions, “Hawkeye, we need a med team, fast. Stark, where the heck are you?”

Loki went back to the spell, and the daggers came shredding out of Thor and forced the Captain to fall backwards to avoid getting a face full of metal. The blades clattered to the ground. Loki swept the Captain aside with his staff. Thor’s cape tore easily, and he wrenched it aside, revealing the armour, leaking blood like a sackful of fresh meat.

There might have been a chance, even then. Thor still breathed, albeit with a hideous rattle. But Iron Man smashed into Loki and sent him flying.

“Idiot!” Loki snarled. “My brother is dying!”

“Don’t try your twisted mind-games on me,” Iron Man said, and unleashed two explosive rockets into Loki’s face.

 

\------

 

Natasha kept her eyes down when Steve broke the news. The collective little gasp, the stunned silence told her everything she needed to know. She calculated quickly what would happen: Tony would throw himself into drink or work, Steve would wander miserably through the streets trying to work out what he did wrong, Bruce would cope, because he was good at coping - right up until the minute he wasn’t. Fury would be angry and take it out on everyone around him. Hawkeye would take it like the professional he was.

“Have you told Loki?” she asked, once the silence had turned awkward.

“He screamed like a goddamn banshee,” Fury said, and snorted. “Fucked up headcase that he is. Probably doesn’t even realise he was the one that killed him.”

“We’ll need to let Asgard know,” Steve said, his voice heavy.

“At least they can’t blame us for this.” Fury tapped his finger on the table. “I’ll find a way to contact Asgard. You are all dismissed.”

As everyone else scraped their chairs back to leave, Natasha looked up at Fury.

“Who called it?”

“A team of Shield paramedics. They did everything they could, considering he’s not human.”

“And they’re sure?”

“He may be a god, but the guy still needs to breathe, agent.”

“Hmm,” Natasha said. She stood up and saluted. “Thank you, sir.”

Fury just shook his head and turned away. Natasha left the room, and headed for the cells.

She paused only briefly, to overwrite the surveillance cameras with a loop of previously shot footage. It wouldn’t fool people for ever, but it would buy her some time.

The magical containment field had been developed by Stark Industries, and Tony had sworn up and down that if they could get Loki into it, it would render him incapable. Natasha looked through the red criss-cross of lasers at the man that sat hunched within. _How many times have you faced the world through the bars of a cage?_ Not that she felt sorry for him. If Natasha had her way, they would have executed Loki after the attack on New York.  

“Loki,” she said.

He turned his head but made no response.

“Is he beyond hope?”

He raised his head properly and Natasha felt the hairs on the back of her neck go up. She had been looked over by some characters in her time, but few could match the sheer mad malevolence of Loki’s gaze. Then, almost like a light bulb switching off, Loki’s eyes went blank.

“Why ask me?”

“Because you’re the only person on Earth that could know for sure,” Natasha said. She had no patience for games this time. “I want to know if there’s a chance we could bring him back. If there is a chance, I intend to take it.”

“Charming though your naiveté is, not all who hail from Asgard are expert healers. Besides, even if I could help, why should I assist you in reviving my enemy?”

Natasha matched him, stare for stare. “Because you need him. For whatever fucked up reason, you need Thor as a witness to your… tricks. Otherwise what meaning do they have? I looked at the footage from that last fight. You were trying to save him. You didn’t think those daggers would work.”

Loki stood up suddenly, the quick movement making Natasha step back from the lasers and her fingers drop to her gun. Loki smirked. “You would work with one who makes you so afraid?”

“I’ll work with anyone that’ll help me get the job done,” Natasha said, keeping her voice flat. “You’re wasting time. Is there hope?”

Loki paced the width of the cell. “There is one way.”

Natasha narrowed her eyes. She hadn’t dared to hope, and now Loki dangled the half-promise in front of her. She had to be careful.

“How? Can they heal him on Asgard?”

“He is dead,” Loki snapped, furious. “This is no longer a matter of healing. It is a question of undoing.”

“We can undo his death,” Natasha said.

“I can undo his death. Though not from this soul-sucking cage.”

“You could use magic to bring him back,” Natasha hesitated. “We’re not talking zombie apocalypse here, are we?”

“We are talking about undoing,” Loki glared at her. “Not re-animating.”

“No zombie-Thor then,” Natasha said. “What do you need to do?”

“I need to go back in time.”

Natasha frowned. “You can do that?”

Loki just stared at her, expression unreadable.

“Why haven’t you done it before?” Natasha shook her head. “No, I don’t buy it. There’s too many times a spell like that would have been useful to you. Thanks for nothing, God of lies.”

Natasha turned to go.

“By the nine, woman, do you damn Thor over a minor question of my abilities?” Loki’s voice was soft, but Natasha could hear the snarl hidden away inside it. “Time travel is not a simple thing, the consequences of a single false action could tear the realms asunder. Yggdrasil falls, and even Ragnarok pales against the chaos that results.”

“So you’ve never risked it,” Natasha said, keeping her back turned. It felt easier to talk to Loki this way, when you didn’t have to parse his expressions. “But you’d risk it for Thor.”

“I would tweak a thread, and hope the tapestry does not unravel.”

“What do you need?”

“I need out of this cage. And someone must ensure they do not burn his body. A funeral would knot his death so inextricably into the flow of time it would become impossible to unpick.”

Natasha sighed. “That one’s on me then. Funerals are out. How long do you need?”

“A few days, at most.”

“And if Yggdrasil falls?”

“Then you pray to your false Gods for forgiveness in death” Loki said. “For nothing will stem that.”

Natasha considered. On the one hand, setting Loki free on a mission that he freely admitted could be the end of the world in the vague hope that he would bring Thor back would not get Fury’s approval. On the other hand, Thor had risked his life many times for Earth, and for the Avengers. Natasha felt they owed him at least to try.

“Alright,” she said. She spun around and dialled her access code into the security pad. The lasers winked out, and Loki vanished almost the second their red glare disappeared. Natasha scowled at the empty cell. “Teleportation would make my job so much easier.”

Still, no time to reflect on the unfairness of the world. Natasha needed to kidnap Thor’s body, preferably before anyone noticed that repeating loop of surveillance footage.     


	2. Loki, I'm Loki

“I can’t believe Nat would do this,” Steve looked utterly despondent. Tony couldn’t blame him. Discovering Loki, Thor’s body and Natasha gone was a pretty huge blow.

“She must have been… coerced somehow. Tricked.”

Tony shrugged. “I dunno man, can’t see anybody getting one over Ms. Romanov.”

“But she couldn’t have done it on purpose!”

“She is the super-spy,” Tony said. “Double-crossing people is kinda in her nature.”

“And tricking people is in Loki’s,” Steve snapped.

Tony expelled a frustrated breath. “Alright, we’ve been going over this who’s to blame ground for at least thirteen minutes now. I’m bored. Move on.”

“We need to get Thor’s body back,” Fury said. “I’ve already informed Heimdall of Thor’s death, and it’s only a matter of days before they send through a procession to collect the body to return it to Asgard.”

“Do you think Loki, or Nat, wanted to cause some kind of interstellar political incident?”

“It doesn’t matter if they wanted it or not, it’s going to happen.” Fury’s mouth turned down. “And defeating an army of Chituri will be child’s play compared to defeating an army of Asgardian warriors. We can’t risk it. We need to reclaim Thor’s body.”

“Shame he doesn’t have some sort of tracking device,” Tony mused. “I knew I should have implanted him with something.”

“What about his hammer?” Steve asked. “That’s… attuned to him in some way. Couldn’t we use the hammer to locate him?”

“Hammer’s still downtown,” Fury said. “Nobody could move it after Thor… after the attack.”

“You got some guys down there?”

“And equipment. Get on it.”

Tony paused. “Okay, you know that was my plan anyway, right? You can’t just turn my plan into an order and then pretend like I’m following your orders. Okay?”

“Whatever helps you sleep,” Fury pointed at Steve. “You go with him. We don’t know what Loki’s plan is yet, or who he might be targeting.”

 

\-----

 

Natasha pulled the curtains of the crummy one bed apartment she’d managed to wheedle out of an old mob boss that owed her a favour. She tried to ignore the solid shape that lay on the floor - after all, she wasn’t going to give up the bed to a corpse - and gave thanks that she knew so many people who specialised in the much needed work of transporting dead people around the country.

A flash of gold, and suddenly Loki stood in the room with her. He gave what would have passed as a pleasant smile if it had come from anyone else. Natasha kept her face still.

“I thought you’d be, you know, off in the past by now.”

“A small challenge,” Loki kept the pleasant smile on his face. “It requires abandoning myself here for a short while, and I have no wish to wake up dead by the hands of my enemies.”

Natasha quirked an eyebrow. “And you couldn’t find any friends to keep watch over you?”

Loki’s smile vanished, and for a second, a split second, Natasha saw that malevolence that burned in his eyes like a flame before that too vanished leaving him looking at her with an inscrutable expression.

“I feel that since we have a common interest, it would be unlikely that you would slay me in my sleep.”

“So I’m guard dog. Fine. I’ve guarded worse things.” Natasha waved at the bed. Looked like she’d be sleeping on the floor after all. “Knock yourself out.”

Loki paced the room. In the tiny apartment he looked even taller, and if he’d been wearing his helmet the horns would have taken out the ceiling.

“This is no easy thing,” he said.

“You told me. I get it. But sympathy? I have none. I just want Thor back.”  


“Why do you care so much for him?”

Natasha shrugged. “He fought beside me. I remember things like that. I’d want someone to do their best to bring me back.”

“Hm,” Loki said.

“Look, I’m not about to stand here and try and convince you that sometimes people do things out of basic decency. But I’d really like this whole thing to be over, so can you get a move on?”

Loki slouched onto the bed, crossing one leg underneath himself. His armour shimmered away. Natasha watched with fascination as he began to do something complex with his hands; long fingers passing over each other as though weaving with invisible threads. A strange smell crept into the air; something clean and chemical. Then Loki’s eyes rolled up in his head and he collapsed backwards against the pillows.

“What, not even a few sparkles or something?” Natasha asked his unconscious form.

 

\-----

 

Loki should not have been surprised when he materialised in a one-room apartment filled with several large men apparently exchanging drugs and money. He had been on Midgard long enough to learn the feel of crime, and the apartment had the cheap, sad air of something used for one nefarious purpose after another. Thor would not be the first corpse it had sheltered.

But he had been so focused on the time travel spell that he was surprised, and the first bullets rattled into him before he could move.

With a snarl, he leaped from the bed and reached for a handful of green flame.

Nothing happened.

Luckily, Loki could think fast, so he switched plans, grabbed the one who had shot him with one hand and used his body as a shield as he fled the room, bullets spraying after him.

The man died halfway down the stairs, and Loki shoved him unceremoniously into a hallway and darted out of the front door into the street outside.

He tried for magic again, a simple illusion, something he could do in his sleep. But he remained alone in the grungy alleyway.

“Norn curse it,” Loki said under his breath.

He had sent himself back in time to about half-an-hour prior to his attack on Thor, assuming that he would be able to teleport to the scene of the Gilla-monster attack. Now he would have to traverse half the city, not to mention deal with the carnage that his own plan had unleashed. There would be SHIELD agents everywhere.

Loki wondered how he would get back to the future. Time travel, poorly understood, had remained something of a mystery to him. There existed little research into it, apart from the various dire warnings about what could happen to those foolish enough to tamper with the threads of time.

The loss of his magic had definitely _not_ been an expected side effect.

Loki hailed a taxi with an imperious hand and it skidded up next to him.

“To the attack,” he instructed the driver.

The driver glanced over his shoulder. “Not a chance.”

“Government orders. I’m required there. If you won’t take me, give me your vehicle. You’ll be compensated - you can get the claim form from the government website.”

The driver narrowed his eyes. “You’re taking my vehicle?”

“Search box on the left hand side. Claim form DGX73-hyphen-13. Now stop stalling, this is your country you’re defending!”

The driver hesitated, but Loki had put just the right amount of brusque officialness into his voice. The driver slid out from the front seat, and Loki took the keys.

It took him a few seconds to work out the controls, and then he raced out onto the road, leaving the driver wide-eyed at the screech and smell of burning rubber. Loki couldn’t help but grin, he had always delighted in speed. Cars swerved to avoid him as he tore through the city. At the sight of a long line of snaking traffic moving at the speed of a stone golem, Loki switched to the pavements. Pedestrians screamed as they leaped for cover.

He smashed through the Shield barricade, scattering the team of agents that stood on guard. A few bullets whined through the back window and buried themselves in the back of Loki’s seat.

Loki slammed the brakes as the fight came into view. A Gila-monster charged past him. Captain America barrelled after it, expression grim and set. Loki watched as he tossed his shield after the creature.

Thor fought just down the street, and Loki abandoned the car and dodged behind debris to make his way toward the fight. He had no desire to be seen by the other-Loki.

Thor stood wielding mjolnir, a steely figure in a bright cape, storm clouds boiling overhead. Loki felt his lip curl. Thor always cut a heroic figure, no matter what he did. He could be smashing the skulls of babies, and people would still assume they were evil babies and that Thor risked great odds to defend them from those evil babies.

Loki hissed out a sigh, and raised his eye to where he knew other-Loki perched on a building ledge above the action. He felt an odd emotion when he saw himself, tall and foreboding, armour gleaming. Intellectually, he knew he no longer inhabited the body of the scrawny weakling that had been bested so utterly at every physical competition, but it felt odd indeed to see himself commanding a field of battle, giant monsters obeying a twitch of his fingers.

Loki saw other-Loki raise his hand and knew the daggers were about to fly.

“Thor!” he disguised his voice, even without magic he could manage that much. “‘Mind your back!”

Thor turned, saw the daggers flashing towards them and smashed them out of the sky with a hammer-blow.

Loki nodded. His task complete, he saw no reason to linger and began to sneak his way back down the road. He had just ducked behind a car, when a sudden bolt of flame turned the car into an exploding fireball.

Loki found himself tossed in the air like a rag-doll, and crashed down on the pavement a few feet away from the burning car. Other-Loki materialised before him, eyes cold.

“Who has taken such a risk, to come warn my brother and save his miserable life?” Other-Loki scanned Loki and his eyes went even colder. “Some fool of an imposter? Why do you wear my face?”

“Brother, what is this?” Thor turned his head from Loki to other-Loki, his eyes narrowed in thought.

Loki rolled neatly to his feet and smoothed the front of his shirt.

“Why would kyrtill and trousers come through time, but not armour?” Loki addressed himself to other-Loki, and ignored Thor. At some point he would have to analyse why he had just undone his own victory, and why he had been so desperate to save his brother; the gleaming hero, whose very presence in this conversation set Loki’s teeth on edge. For the moment he had bigger problems.

Other-Loki crooked his eyebrow. “You expect me to believe you are myself, unloosed in time? I know full well what such travels entail. You would uproot yggdrasil itself.”

“A calculated risk,” Loki said.

Other-Loki shook his head, slowly. Loki noted the way his knuckles gripped the scepter he held, and when other-Loki suddenly lunged forward for a killing-blow Loki sidestepped and spun away from the flashing tip.

“Enough!” Thor roared and swung Mjollnir at other-Loki, who dodged. A dozen other-Loki’s appeared, and Thor swung at them furiously.

Loki slid cautiously away from the fight, and noted the Gila-monster that had rumbled into view at the end of the street. Time to leave. Loki hurried down the street, keeping to the edge of the buildings. The repercussions of what he had just done were worrying. With Thor alive, the chain of events that had sent him back in time ceased to have meaning. Would he vanish? Or would this reality peel away from the reality he had come from? Or would this be the thing that fractured time, and brought about chaos and the end of all dimensions?

“Foolish, foolish, indeed,” Loki panted to himself as he rounded a corner and found himself face-to-face with Captain America.

Captain America gave a shout and leapt forward to grab Loki, but Loki ducked and left Captain America’s fist closing on empty air.

“Thor! I’ve got him!” Captain America shouted, and started chasing Loki down the street.

Loki had always been fast, but to his anger Captain America could keep pace, a few feet behind him. Loki vaulted cars and weaved through alleyways, but couldn’t shake the star-spangled shadow racing determinedly along behind him.

Then a woman dropped from the sky, landed in front of him and smacked a steel pipe straight into Loki’s jugular.

 

\--------

 

Natasha had learned how to come awake all at once, clear headed, She sat up and realised that Thor, sprawled on the floor beside her, was snoring uproariously.

Natasha felt a smile spread across her face. “Thor! You’re alive!” She kicked him in the side and he woke up with a start.

“Natasha! Wonderful to see you! Where are we?” Thor looked around the apartment with a baffled expression.

“It’s a long story,” Natasha replied and then realised that she had missed the crumpled figure that still lay on the bed. Blue lights glowed and wound around his hands, tracing strange patterns, like a contour map of a dream world. Natasha bit her lip. “Hmm.”

“Is that…” Thor came to his feet, and Natasha wondered again at how nimbly he moved for such a big man.

“Yes,” Natasha said. “It is.”

“I think you had better tell me your ‘long story’,” Thor said, his voice grave.

 

\-------

 

“Don’t get me wrong,” Tony said. “I’m glad Thor’s alive, but-”

Thor pulled a face.

“-but you don’t fuck with time.” Tony crossed his arms across his chest and grinned at the unconscious Loki on the bed, watching the patterns that wove ribbons around his hands. “Although, man, think what you could do with that shit.”

Thor glanced at Natasha. “Why did he agree to bring me back?”

Natasha gave an uncomfortable shrug and didn’t reply,

“Natasha can persuade anyone to do anything,” Tony said. He smirked at Natasha. “That’s not really our problem right now, though. Jarvis? Get me a scan on that eldritch junk.”

“Sir,” Jarvis said, affably.

“Can you bring him over to Stark Tower?” Tony asked Thor. “I’ve got better kit there.”

“Do you think he’s safe to move?” Natasha asked.

“Well, I guess he might wake up and start another world war, but otherwise he’s pretty safe.” Tony flipped his fingers at Thor. “Come on, I’ve got science to do. Puzzles to solve. Fun to be had.”

“You and Loki are much alike,” Thor lifted Loki and slung him over his shoulder.

“God damn, man, you’ve got quite a way with insults.” Tony put his hand over his heart. “I’m hurt. Really.”

Thor smiled at Tony. “Let us go, so that you can work your ‘science’.”

  



	3. Double trouble

_The Past_

Loki opened his eyes, and saw the cracked grey tiles and familiar criss-cross red lasers that meant an anti-magic field.

“I am getting exceptionally tired of coming around inside a prison cell.”

“Stop committing crimes then, brother,” Thor sounded surprisingly cheerful. Normally when he spoke to Loki these days his voice dripped with angst and seriousness. It irritated Loki. But then, everything about Thor irritated Loki.

“And for what imagined crime have I been imprisoned this time?” Loki turned his head to see Thor, leaning on mjolnir, relaxed and grinning.

“Apparently the one of saving my life.” Thor gave a snort of laughter. “Who knew it comprised such a felony?”

“I have no patience for your feeble jokes, brother.”

“Stark says your magic has vanished,” Thor said. “But I believe it has been stolen. Stolen by that imposter that wears your face.”

With a jolt, Loki realised why Thor had become so cheerful. He believed Loki had been the victim of identity theft. That his brother was as unsullied as the day they had ridden together to Jotunheim so that Thor could start his silly war.

Loki sat up and studied Thor thoughtfully. For a moment he let himself imagine it; his crimes exonerated, riding back to Asgard as, if not a _hero_ , then at least not a villain. Thor clapping him on his shoulder, Odin…

He shut the fantasy off. It always fell apart as soon as he visualised that glowering, single-eyed visage. What would he ride back to? The knowledge of the lies he had been brought up on.

If he ever rode back to Asgard, it would be at the head of a conquering army.

Loki raised an eyebrow at Thor. “What do you intend to do?”

“First, I must convince Fury of your innocence. He is a most suspicious Midgardian, perhaps the most suspicious I have ever met. But once I have done that, we shall hunt down this false-Loki, and we shall force him to return your magic.”

“A cunning plan,” Loki said. Could it be that easy? Well, as long as Loki had no magic there could only be an advantage in having the Avengers on his side. Loki couldn’t work out what would happen if he took his own magic from his past self, but with luck he could return to his own timeline.

Thor would be alive, and his heart would break all the more painfully when Loki betrayed him - again.

“Do you believe it can be done, Loki? Do you recall how he took your magic?”

“Theft of power is a common crime,” Loki considered. “Mayhap he created some symbolic object of power and transferred it between representations of myself and him.”

“Do you know how to get it back?”

“Yes,” Loki said. “But you must not kill him.” The Norns only knew what would happen if his past-self died.

“As you wish brother,” Thor beamed. “I shall find him and bring him to you.”

“Let me out of this cage?” Loki waved his hands at the criss-cross of lasers that separated him from his brother.

“I cannot, brother. Not until Fury is convinced.”

“Are you Fury’s little pet, that you allow him to wrongfully imprison a Prince of Asgard?”

“Nay. But I am Earth’s defender.” Thor’s eyes clouded over. “Your tongue is sharp, my brother. You do not realise what you… your counterpart has done, nor how much you are feared and hated here. You would do well to practice diplomacy.”

“With humans? Diplomacy is wasted on creatures such as they. They have not the wit to understand it. Nor, for that matter, the strength to protest a more direct order.”

“You are wrong,” Thor rubbed his chin. “It took me some time to understand the value of humans myself, so perhaps I can understand why you think them of so little worth. But I have found that they are more inventive, more resourceful, than perhaps any other race of the nine realms.”

Loki quirked an eyebrow. “Are you mad?”

“No. I have seen a handful of them hold back an invasion force of thousands. I have seen strategy and clear thinking, compassion and justice, and self-sacrifice in the name of a greater duty.”

Loki almost retorted, but caught himself in time. His counterpart had brought the invading Chitauri. Not him. “You always were too easily impressed,” he said, instead.

Thor sighed. “Perhaps. I do not have time to argue it with you, Loki. I will find this imposter, and you must bear with this cage until I return.”

“I do not appear to have a choice,” Loki rolled his eyes, and lay back on the bed, crossing his arms behind his head.

“I will be hasty, brother.” Thor hesitated a moment and then lowered his eyes. “I cannot tell you how glad I am to see you.”

“Sentiment, Thor, is not becoming on you.”

“Perhaps not, and yet I am still glad. We have much to catch up on.”

“Afterwards. Before this imposter can wreak more havok in my name. ” Loki said.

Thor nodded, turned and left the room.

Loki studied the ceiling and ran through the various permutations of a plan. Only one thing worried him.

Just what the impact of his interference with time would be.

 

\----

_The future_

Natasha jumped to her feet the second Tony emerged from his lab. “So have you worked out what’s happened to Loki?”

Tony yawned as he poured himself a cup of coffee. “Of course I have. I’m a genius. It’s definitely temporal. As for what that means? I have no fucking idea.”

Natasha started to reply, but was interrupted by the slam of the door. Steve stood in the doorway, his face pale. “Guys, I think we have a problem.”

“What’s happened?” Natasha grabbed her jacket and pulled it on.

“Can you turn on the news?” Steve asked Tony.

Tony shrugged and whipped a screen seemingly out of thin air. A reporter appeared, standing in front of  a hazy cloud bank.

“-- an exploratory team sent in to investigate the strange substance lost radio contact almost immediately. There has been no sign of them since they entered the cloud three hours ago. Authorities state that they are ‘baffled’ by what has happened. What is clear is that the 130 million people living in Japan have also disappeared, without trace, and that the cloud is expanding. Honshu and other nearby islands are being evacuated, and the residents being taken to Australia, where an emergency refugee camp has been set up.”

Natasha blinked. “Japan is… gone?”

“Vanished into that cloud.” Steve nodded at the screen.

Tony tipped the coffee down his throat, groaned, and hurried from the room. Natasha and Steve followed him.

“It must be linked to that temporal energy.” Tony said as he jogged down the corridor. “Shit, I told you messing around with time was a bad idea. You disrupt causality, you disrupt everything. I don’t know where that ends.” Tony entered the lab, where Loki was hooked into a mass of high-tech machinery. Thor hovered next to his brother, looking awkwardly out of place amongst the sleek equipment.

“Theoretically, it’s not even possible. We can’t move into the past, because the past becomes our future and the Universe can’t handle time moving in two different directions. If we invent time-travel, it’s a one way way journey.” Tony looked down at Loki. “But magic, it doesn’t obey the laws of physics. That’s why it isn’t science, despite what the Asgardians are always saying it being one and the same, blah blah blah. On a really basic fucking level you shouldn’t be able to create energy transference with a thought. But fireball spells, they exist. I figure, okay, maybe it has something to do with particles and antiparticles right?”

Steve shook his head. “Tony, this is beyond me. The question is, can we fix it?”

“We couldn’t even replicate the problem, let alone create a solution.” Tony studied the patterns of energy winding around Loki’s hands where they lay crossed across his chest. “We need to wake him up.”

“How?” Natasha asked.

“I don’t know.” Tony kept staring at Loki’s hands. “I think that energy, it’s acting as a sort of homing beacon. Loki should just be able to hook onto it and come back.”

“Do you think this is part of some greater scheme?” Thor asked.

“I don’t,” Natasha said. “Too many uncontrolled variables. He never intended to kill you, Thor.”

Thor nodded and bent his blond head over his brother. Natasha felt a stab of sympathy for him. It was a terrible thing, to see a loved one turn bad. Natasha had seen the look of betrayal on many faces in her life. She hoped she would never cause such a look amongst the Avengers.

“What can we do while you’re working here?” Steve asked.

Tony picked up a screwdriver. “Bring me some more coffee. Or, I don't know, help evacuate people near the cloud. Whichever one makes you feel more useful I guess.”

Steve nodded, indicated to Nat and Thor to follow him. “Give us an update the moment you discover anything.”

“Sure, sure,” Tony said, absently, already delving into the inner working of the machine closest to him.

Natasha glanced up at Thor and saw the pinch between his eyebrows. She gave his arm a sympathetic squeeze. "He'll be alright Thor. Tony knows what he's doing."

"I trust him," Thor said gravely. But the frown didn't fade.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the comments! I apologise for my incredibly sporadic posting, but the next chapter is nearly complete so you should see it in the next two weeks.


	4. The future's not so far away

_The past._

 

His brother was well.

He had never attacked New York, never attempted to wipe Jotunheim off the map, never tried to kill Thor. Thor felt the weight lift from his shoulders as he ran down the hall to where Tony and Steve awaited him.

“We must capture the False Loki,” Thor announced as he strode into the room. He waved Mjolnir in the air. “He will pay for the grievous sins he has visited upon my family.”

“Hold up blondie, it's not hammer time yet." Tony’s eyes didn’t leave his phone. "Let’s think about this logically. This allegedly imposter-Loki? He knows we’ve got the allegedly real-Loki here right?”

Thor let the _allegedly_ slide. His brother was well. Had never thrown himself into the void. Had never lied about Odin dying.

Tony kept his attention on the phone. “I mean that’s the perfect bait, right? Doesn’t matter who’s the real Loki, either one of them is going to want to grab the other one. So the allegedly-fake-Loki is going to show up here. All we have to do is wait.”

Thor’s frowned. “I do not wish to sit and wait. He may take days to come to that decision. Meanwhile, my brother has been condemned to rot in a prison, thanks to this miscreants crimes.”

“He’s not rotting! My prison happens to be very comfortable. And he’s only been in there for about five seconds.” Tony glared at Thor.

“Thor.” Steve leaned forward. “We can’t just take Loki’s word for this. We’ve got no evidence, and we need to keep an open mind.”

“Plus the guy is like a freaking master illusionist, not to mention he’s kind of known for lying.” Tony twirled his phone between his fingers. “Anyway. If I know my supervillains - and I do - he’ll be here today. Probably within the hour.” Tony swiped his finger across the phone. “He knows that we know that he has to come here. Time gives us time to prepare… a trap, defences, whatever. He’ll strike fast… and hard. Luckily, I have a plan.”

“What’s your plan?” Captain America picked up his shield.

“Actually, it’s less of a plan and more of an experiment.” Tony tossed his phone onto the table and a cascade of screens flickered around him. Footage of the area around the Avengers building came into focus. “I’ve mobilised the anti-magic field. If I can get within a hundred foot radius of the guy then I can remove his most potent weapon. And after that, well, I figure you and Thor can handle one scrawny Asgardian.”

“He may not be from Asgard,” Thor said. “He has taken my brother’s shape, but we do not know what his real shape is.”

“Allegedly taken Loki’s shape.” Tony gave Thor a sidelong glance. “C’mon blondie. You gotta have some suspicions about this.”

Thor felt his knuckles tighten around the handle of Mjolnir. “I have struggled to believe the brother I knew… the one I grew up with… could have been capable of the evil he inflicted on your world, and on Jotunheim.”

“I struggle to believe a lot of things. Like you, standing there with your cape and your magic mallet. That kind of throws me for a loop sometimes. But c’mon…” Tony’s eyes softened. “You’re just setting yourself up to be hurt.”

“Let’s leave the trial for later,” Captain America nodded to the screens surrounding Tony. A familiar figure in dark leather, edged with green, had come into view. “Let’s focus on taking him down. Then we can find out who he is.”

“Yup. Let’s get this show on the road.” Tony raised his left arm as a piece of the Iron Man suit flew into the room. It unfolded outwards, a metallic butterfly uncurling its wings. More pieces flew into the room and Tony vanished, enveloped in the Iron Man suit.

Thor followed the Captain, feeling a grin spread across his face at the prospect of a good fight with a man who had committed treason with Loki’s face.

 

 

The man pretending to be Loki strode towards the front entrance, peeling off shots of green fire that took out cameras and defence weapons. SHIELD agents scrambled for cover.

Thor slammed down in front of the impostor and swung his hammer. Fake-Loki ducked, spun, and enveloped Thor in a curtain of green fire. Thor roared with anger and pain. Always he had held back in these fights with his brother. He had been unable to forget those days that they had tussled as children, unwilling to hurt a man that he had fought alongside, had hunted with, had shared stories with.

Now there was nothing to hold him back. This man with the fierce grin and crazy eyes was not his brother.

Thor whipped Mjolnir around his head. A frantic wind picked up. Thor looked at that thin face and threw Mjolnir with a shout of pure rage.

The impostor slammed backwards from the force of the impact, sliding fifty feet along the road. Lightning crashed from the sky and struck him in an explosion of sparks.

The impostor snarled and rolled into a crouch, his cloak smouldering.

Iron Man landed behind him, whipped up one arm and shot a dart-like projectile at Loki’s back. The dart buried itself in the green cloak and a spider-web of red lasers erupted and began to form a barrier. The impostor ripped the burning cloak from his shoulders and flung it at Iron Man, disrupting the lasers. Iron Man fell back, with the cloak wrapped around his visor.

Thor brought down a fork of lightning that charred the ground and sent tarmac flying. The impostor leapt aside, then ducked as the Captain’s shield came flying through the air. Thor felt a flicker of unease. He knew Loki’s fighting style, and this creature moved and thought exactly like the brother he had wrestled with so many years ago.

No, Thor thought. This wasn’t his brother. He didn’t have to hold back. The storm rumbled around them. Bolts of lightening slammed down, faster than the eye could follow. The impostor leaped frantically to avoid them. A handful of daggers flew towards Thor, but Thor slammed his hammer into the ground and the shock wave scattered the daggers aimlessly. Thor jerked the hammer back, then let it fly. It passed a hair-breadth's from the impostor's head.  

“What is this, Thor?” the Fake-Loki shouted, “Have you finally decided to try and kill me?”

“Who are you?” Thor yelled above the sound of the storm.

Fake-Loki turned and spread his arms, a dramatic figure against the stormy sky. “Who do you think I am?”

“It’s an illusion!” Captain America shouted from the foyer of the Avengers building. “Loki’s in here!”

The illusionary Loki faded into green light with a peal of laughter. Thor growled and rushed to join the Captain who was deflecting bolts of magic with his shield. The hallway was a mess of rubble and sparks.

Iron Man got there first, body slamming the impostor to the ground and sending another dart into the armour-clad torso. Red lasers flickered and enveloped the two of them. The impostor gave a heave and rolled Iron Man off. His fingers closed around the dart just as the lasers completed their deployment and formed an entire cage around the man with his brother's face.

“All yours!” Iron Man shouted.

Thor dropped Mjolnir and raced forward. He landed a punch that caused the man to double over with a snarl, before uncurling with a dagger clenched in one hand. The knife flashed out, straight for Thor’s face, but the Captain’s shield struck Loki’s arm and sent the blade flying.

Thor threw himself at the impostor, using his whole weight to slam the smaller man to the floor. His hands enveloped the thin wrists and pinned them in place. The impostor twisted and jerked beneath him, snarling with fury, but he couldn’t shift Thor. So had Thor and Loki fought as children, and Thor’s superior strength and weight always meant those fights ended the same way - with Thor holding his brother down and Loki shouting with rage beneath him.

The impostor appeared to think the same thing, and stopped struggling, his face relaxing into a supercilious smirk.

“Who are you?” Thor roared, already afraid of the answer.

“Interesting toy you’ve developed,” the impostor spoke past Thor and addressed himself to Tony.

“Thanks,” Tony said. “I made it especially for you.”

“I’m flattered,” the impostor purred.

“Tell me who you are!” Thor growled the question, lowering his face and staring into the impostor’s eyes as though he could divine the answer there.

Fake-Loki raised one eyebrow. “Did you hit your head? I’m Loki. But I think there is a more interesting question. Who is the man you have locked up in there?”

“You are not my brother, false-man. Loki has told me everything.”

“You always were an idiot.” Fake-Loki gave a sudden jerk, but Thor was ready for it and kept the impostor pinned.

“Be silent!” Thor pulled the impostor to his feet, twisting one arm up behind his back until the impostor’s face spasmed with pain.

“Easy, blondie,” Iron Man produced a pair of handcuffs. “Don’t break his arm.”

“Hmm.” Captain America clipped the handcuffs around the fake-Loki’s wrists, and then looked at Iron Man. “You got another one of those laser cells?”

“Nope. Figured there was only one Loki.” Tony sighed. “Man, putting them in the same cell seems like a recipe for disaster.”

“We must transfer the power between them,” Thor said.

“Is that even possible?” Tony asked.

“Loki said it was. He spoke of a symbolic object that was used by this man to steal his magic.”

The impostor gave the long-suffering sigh of a martyr.

“We need to make sure we know which one is which.” Captain America frowned at the man Thor held.

“Well, we can’t hang out here all day.” Tony flicked his visor up and gave a reckless grin. “Let’s put the two of them face to face and see what happens.”

 

 

 

Loki sat up on the bed when they brought past-Loki to his cell. He studied himself with some fascination. Earlier he had been struck by how tall and imposing past-Loki had looked, so far from his mental image of himself as the scrawny child he had been. Now, however, he had been stripped of his cloak and armour, and next to Thor he seemed diminutive, a thin shadow next to a glowing giant. His eyes didn’t stop moving, flicking around the cell, flashing over Loki, and jumping between the Avengers.

Loki hissed his breath between his teeth and focused on holding his own gaze steady.

“Right,” Tony said. “What now? A tea-party?”

“We must find a way to transfer the power from the false Loki to the real Loki,” Thor said, in a tone that would brook no disagreement.

“I don’t know man, a tea-party sounds more fun.”

“How can we tell which one is the real Loki?” Steve said. “We can’t just take his word for it.”

“Do you think I would not know my own brother?” Thor’s voice rose.

“I’ve watched Jerry Springer.” Tony produced a q-tip and waved it at past-Loki. “There’s only one way to know who's the Daddy. I’ll take a swab.”

“How very dark-ages,” Past-Loki said. “But it won’t do you much good. Thor is not my brother.”

“I’m not matching you with Thor, Reindeer Games. I’ve got your DNA on file.”

Past-Loki gave a resigned shrug and opened his mouth. Tony took the swab and dropped the q-tip into a plastic bag. He produced another one and jabbed it aggressively at Loki. “Your turn.”

Loki knew what the DNA would show. Two Loki’s. Identical. He appealed to Thor. “You said you would help me get my power back.”

“We must be sure.” Thor said. “Brother, please understand. You have been gone for a long time, and this… person that wears your face has wrought havoc. He lied a great deal… and even in the past, Loki my brother, you have not always spoken true.”

“I am a prince of Asgard,” Loki said. “It is demeaning.”

Past-Loki gave a bark of laughter. “Your fear of this process shows your fear of the outcome. You are the impostor! The only question is why… is this your foolish attempt to steal my power?” Past-Loki’s eyes glittered in a way that could be described as maniacal.

Was this really how Loki looked to others?  

Past-Loki stalked forward, with a crooked grin. “You want my magical power, and hope to trick Thor into aiding you. Your plan is pathetic, a child could conceive of something more intriguing. Though, I admit, Thor is very stupid and appears to have fallen for it.”

“My brother knows me,” Loki turned to Thor, eyes wide. “I have proven my loyalty to him, our future King, again and again. How many battles have we fought, side-by-side? How many times have I saved your life?”

“What is the last thing you remember of us, brother?” Thor asked, frowning.

Loki thought fast. How far back did he have to go, before he had begun sabotaging Thor? Too far. But he knew when things had turned truly dark. Before that ill-thought war in Jotunheim.

“We hunted together, in preparation for the feast at your crowning ceremony.”

Thor shook his head slowly. “Impossible.”

Once the lie had been said, you had to play it to the hilt. “It is true, my brother. My powers were taken that night, and I was spirited away to a dark realm.”

“I think not,” Past-Loki leaned against the wall of the cell, smiling faintly.

“What has this man done, wearing my name and face, that would make you distrust me so?” Loki appealed again to Thor.

“The last thing you remember is hunting for my crowning ceremony. Yet you called me the future King. Brother…” Thor stopped, hunting for words. Loki noted the way the other two avengers looked at Thor, their faces full of pity. He felt a sudden flash of anger. What right had the backward humans of Earth to pity a Son of Odin and an Asgardian?

“You do not wear the crown, Thor. It does not take so much to guess it turned foul. What went wrong?”

“Enough of this sycophantic questioning.” Past-Loki waved a hand dismissively. “Man of Iron, finish your test. I myself am curious to know what this impostor is.”

“Open your mouth,” Tony said to Loki.

Loki gave Thor one last expression of appeal, but Thor shook his head firmly.

Loki sighed and opened his mouth. Tony took the swab, and the avengers retreated, leaving the two Loki’s to study each other.

“You cannot be a using a shapeshift spell,” Past-Loki said, thoughtful now. “This soul-sucking field would have ended it.”

“What’s your plan for getting out of here?” Loki ran his eyes over the lasers. If he could get himself kidnapped by Past-Loki, create a symbolic image of power, and transfer the magic to himself he could get back to his own timeline. The longer he stayed in the past, the more threads unravelled around him.

“I intend to abide here a while,” Past-Loki said, crossing his arms. “Let Stark do the hard work of working out just who, or what, you are. You haven’t used magic to steal my shape, or this cage would have revealed you. So you must have a natural talent for mimicry. Perhaps you are but a golem, constructed with my face and memories, but then the question becomes… who sent you. And for what purpose.”

“I’ve already told you who I am,” Loki said, irritably. He didn’t want to speak truthfully in front of the camera, not with Thor already suspicious of his story. Could he convince Past-Loki to give up some of magic willingly? He only needed enough to find the locator, wrapped around his hands a few hours in the future.

Past-Loki relaxed against the wall of the cell, a faint smile playing across his face. “Oh yes, you were spirited away from the hunt. Well, well, let us assume that is when you took my form. ”

Past-Loki lunged forward suddenly and gripped his arm in an icy fist. Loki jerked away, suddenly realising what his opposite number was doing. Blue fingers, freezing cold, and his own skin reacting the only way it could, absorbing the cold. Past-Loki had intended to ice him but instead…

Past-Loki’s eyes widened with shock, even as the green drained from them to be replaced with red. Loki shuddered with revulsion, looking upon his Jotun face and ripped his arm away. He turned his back on Past-Loki and struggled to master his own transformation.

“You are truly myself,” Past-Loki said, his voice stunned.

“And you are truly a fool,” Loki replied. Norns, but he hated his Jotun appearance. The shock of the forced transformation had left him shaking, but not from cold.

“You were not lying when you said that you came through time. But what could have possessed you to take that risk?”

Loki watched the blue fade from his fingers and tried to think.

“It does not matter. I am here, and as long as I am here-”

“Time is unravelling.” Past-Loki finished the sentence.

“I need magic to return. Let me have yours. It matters not to you, you will have it again in a few hours.”

“A few hours in which anything could happen.” Past-Loki sank down into a cross-legged position, and tipped his head back. “No. There is a larger scheme at work here, and I will unravel it.” He smiled, a crooked grin that showed his teeth. “After all, you are not going anywhere.”

 

 

 

Steve had taken Thor to the bar at the top of the Avengers tower, leaving Tony to run the DNA tests. Pouring two pint glasses of dark beer, he pushed one to Thor who took it gratefully.

“Can I ask you something?” Steve leaned back in the chair, and gave Thor an appraising stare. “What are you going to do with Loki once we’ve worked out which one is the real one?”

Thor took a swig of the beer. It was high quality, not that he should expect less from Tony. “I… do not know. For a moment I had hoped… hoped that he could return to Asgard. That all could go back the way it was. But even if he speaks the truth about being taken at the hunt, and I am not so sure of that, there is much that… complicates.”

“Like the fact he’s adopted.”

“Yes. Even if he was innocent of all crimes, Asgard is not. My brother is…” Thor took another drink and for an instance the face of a Frost Giant slips into his mind, fierce and alien. “He was taken, from a hostile force during a time of war.” A memory comes to him. “I am not innocent either. I remember, in my youth, I thought him weak.” Thor takes another drink of the beer. “I fear I treated him with disregard and cruelty.”

Steve raised an eyebrow. “You? I think you’re being a bit hard on yourself.”

“Once, the Warriors and I decided to compete with each other. Who could ride a bilgesnipe the longest. It is a common, if dangerous, dare amongst children out to prove themselves. Loki insisted he be included. He always wanted to join us on our adventures, despite all we did to avoid him.” Thor’s voice was heavy, he can picture his younger brother storming after them as they rode out after having told him they would meet on the other side of the palace.

“And he did badly?” Steve sounded sympathetic.

“No. He stayed on the longest of all of us.” Thor stared down at the beer, remembering the way Loki had hung on grimly, foolishly small against the great humping bilgesnipe. Fandral had mocked his technique, cruel witticisms that questioned Loki’s strength and his riding skill. Volstagg had roared with laughter. Thor had goaded them on.

The laughter had died away as the seconds turned to minutes and Sif had raised one slim black eyebrow at Thor at the moment Loki bypassed Thor’s own time.

“He beat me, and I was furious. I accused him of cheating, of using some trickery. I had never lost a competition before, and how could my brother, his nose always stuck in some book, possibly best me at a game of strength and endurance?” Thor lowered his eyes, the shame burning in him. “We left him, alone, in the wilderness. He did not return to the palace for two days.”

Steve tried to hide his wince, but Thor saw it. “You are right to be disgusted. It was a most shameful act.”

Steve gave an awkward shrug. “Well, it’s not great. But it was a long time ago.”

“After that he never beat me at anything,” Thor frowned, remembering the pattern of their lives. “And he chose only to study the things I had no interest in; knives, magic, poisons, games of strategy.”

Steve stayed silent.

“So much of who he is, of what he became… is because of me. Because I left him no room to be anything else.” Thor finished the rest of the beer in a single gulp and slammed the glass onto the table. “We cannot return to what things used to be. But perhaps we can move forward to something better.”

“I hope you can, I really do.” Steve hesitated, but then pushed forward. “But what if you can’t? If he did bring the chitauri, did murder all those people. If this is another lie, a way for him to hurt you again?”

“I do not want to believe it.” Thor said, his voice soft. “But if that is so, he cannot be allowed to roam freely.”    

“Uh, guys?” Tony’s voice, the speakers too loud, echoed in the room. “You might want to take a look at this security footage.”

 

 

 

Thor couldn’t repress the shock he felt at the sight of Loki’s Jotun face. For a moment on the screen two Frost Giants stare at each other and Thor’s world shook. He had listened to the words, had understood intellectually that his brother was a Jotun. But nothing could have prepared him for that bloom of blue rising up in Loki’s skin. For the red eyes that shone with inner fire.

“So neither of them are Loki?” Tony threw his hands in the air. “Fuck, just how many people are running around with his face?”

“They are both Loki,” Thor said. The two figures returned to their normal appearance; one turned away, his mouth working with disgust.

“Hostile race, huh?” Steve gave Thor a sidelong glance.

“Both of them? How is that even possible? Loki has an even eviler twin?” Tony glared at the screen.

“I do not know how it is possible,” Thor said, still shaken.

“Fucking great. As if one megalomaniacal god-like sorcerer wasn’t-” Tony was interrupted by a ring-tone. “That’s your phone, Cap.”

“Oh right, hang on.” Steve fumbled with his phone. “Yes, hello? Right. No, I wasn’t aware. Hang on, let me ask Tony.” Steve looked at Tony with a frown. “Nick Fury says a second Japan has just turned up.”

“What?” Tony flipped his own phone on, scattering screens across the room. Half a dozen news channels appeared. Satellite images showed the two Japans, almost touching, like two spoons nestled together.

“It must be… some kind of false imaging? Someone’s hacked the satellites?”

“Fury says he’s got agents on the ground in Japan. They can see the new land mass from the coast. It seems to be populated, too.”

On the news screens, half-a-dozen interviews were being given with Japanese citizens.

“There’s no way. You can’t just create a new landmass.”

“Maybe… cloning technology?” Steve guessed.

Tony shook his head. “There’s no tech that could do something even remotely similar to this.”

“Then magic.”

“Argh!” Tony slammed his fist onto the table. “I fucking hate magic! Let’s just re-write the laws of physics! Hey, why not? Oh, I don’t know, maybe because physics is how the fucking universe works!” He glowered at the second Japan. “It gives me the creeps.”

Thor watched a scrolling ticker tape across the bottom of one of the screens. _Islands of Toshima, Niijima, Kouzu, Miyake and Mikura all destroyed by the presence of the new land mass. Oshima island hit by tidal wave. Minor earthquakes have struck several cities along the East coast of Japan._

Steve looked grim. “Fury? We’ll investigate.”

“I’ll take the suit. Faster.” Tony jumped up. “Find out what that thing is made of.”

“There’s something else we’ve got a duplicate of,” Steve said as he hung up.  He waved the phone at the footage of the cell with the two Loki’s.

Tony paused. “Aw hell. This does have crazy written all over it. But what would Loki gain from creating a new country?”

“I think,” Steve said. “We should ask him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I am sort of ignoring everything after The Avengers for the purposes of this fic. Sorry.  
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
